Vox pop

With reference to the editorial Read between the scorelines (Our Take, June 7), the latest landslide victory of the BJP in the Gujarat bypolls has further cemented Narendra Modi’s chances of becoming his party’s prime ministerial candidate for the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.

Bypoll defeat must force Nitish to reconsider his anti-Modi stanceWith reference to the editorial Read between the scorelines (Our Take, June 7), the latest landslide victory of the BJP in the Gujarat bypolls has further cemented Narendra Modi’s chances of becoming his party’s prime ministerial candidate for the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. With the JD(U) suffering a crushing defeat in the Maharajganj Lok Sabha byelection, Nitish Kumar needs to analyse the cause and revisit his anti-Modi stance. Having said that, the results of the bypoll are a signal for the BJP to formulate a more cohesive election strategy for the 2014 elections.Pramod Srivastava, via email

Not giving parties an advantageWith reference to the report Parties slam door on info, govt plans to dilute RTI (June 5), the Chief Information Commission’s recent order which ruled that political parties should be subject to scrutiny under the Right to Information Act is laudable. This would ensure greater transparency in the electoral system. Political parties get public land at nominal costs and also enjoy the benefits of tax exemptions. They should be made to share information about their sources of income. The fact that almost all parties are opposed to bringing themselves under the RTI scanner seems proof that their commitment to ensuring transparency and accountability is only half-hearted. Devendra Khurana, Bhopal

Religion is not the card to playIn his article In God’s own country (Modern Indian, June 7), Amish has rightly said that countering religious extremism with secular extremism only replaces one monster with another. But in our country, politicians often use the flimsiest of pretexts to use religious ideologies for political gain. It is time we put a stop to this politics of religion. Sapan Garg, via email

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